The modern awareness of the importance of regular physical exercise has been driving a steady growth for the fitness industry. Given the pressures of modern lifestyle, people of all age groups are concerned with the amount of time required to achieve a reasonable level of fitness, thereby highlighting the need to provide workout programs, machines and accessories which allow the maximum physical workout to be achieved in the shortest amount of time. This focus on efficiency led to the development of multi featured exercise machines, now commonly found in health clubs, gymnasiums and households alike.
Proper ergonomic and stability considerations have evolved steadily over the past several years. Still, many of the exercise machines presently found in the market fail to address issues like adequate, continuous support to the user's body throughout the workout routine, and in some instances can lead to injuries due to the jerking, spasmodic nature of the user's movements as well as undue stress on several body joints. Proper consideration of these aspects is especially important for the following users: the elderly, pregnant women, those with some orthopedic condition and people who are not in shape, amongst others.
In the so called “dual action” or “total body” exercise machines the concept of harmonization of movements is important from the perspectives of ergonomics and comfort. Without sound consideration of the interplay between diverse body part movements, the resulting exercise may be perceived by the user as awkward and unpleasant. Worse still, in an effort to compensate for insufficient or non-continuous support by the machine itself, the user is typically forced to tense up other muscle groups in order to preserve his or her balance, yielding unnecessary extra muscular effort that is unintended and potentially harmful to the user. This problem is especially serious for novice users, whose tendency to attribute any discomfort during the exercise to their poor fitness condition might lead to serious injuries.
Many of the prior art dual action exercise machines lead the user to motions that compromise comfort, efficiency and in some circumstances safety. To overcome these limitations, the present invention provides an exercise machine designed around the concept of dynamic and geometric balance, mitigating the aforementioned problems.